A Northport High School senior has been elected to the highest international position of a youth group designed to bring Jewish teens closer to the religion through learning and social interaction.

Ethan Feuer, 17, is international president of United Synagogue Youth (USY), the youth movement of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism. The USY has more than 350 local chapters and a membership of thousands of North American teenagers.

He was one of six students elected to the 2016 International Executive Board during USY’s 65th International Convention in Baltimore.

“Starting right now, we need to redefine USY as being about relationships,” Feuer said. “If you can change one person’s understanding of what they’re capable of, how much people care about them, or how powerful a source of change they can be, you can change everything.”

Feuer, who also is president of USY’s Metropolitan New York region, will spend 2016 representing the organization at Jewish events worldwide and guiding members toward the organization’s principles of leadership, social action and relationship building.

To run for the International Executive Board, candidates were asked to submit letters of intention and petitions signed by at least 100 members representing five or more USY chapters, or 20 percent of the teens in their region.

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Michael Ebert is an education researcher and has worked for Newsday in various capacities since 2003. He was part of an 11-person team named 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalists for investigative coverage of the LIRR's platform safety issues.